By: Tim Seeley (writer), Daniel Leister (art), Mark Englert (colors), Crank (letters) & James Lowder (edits)
The Story: Old slashers are coming back from the dead!
What’s Good: What do readers expect from Hack/Slash? They expect slashers/monsters, bloody fights with those slashers and scantily clad women. It is so refreshing to read a comic that knows its niche and exploits that niche month-after-month.
The story is picking up a really good homage to 80’s slasher films. What was the first thing that you thought when you watched those movies and the bad guy gets “killed” with 15 minutes left in the film? Of course he isn’t really dead. Slashers always come back! And that theme is running in spades through this action packed issue that brings almost all of the Hack/Slash main characters into the action.
Seeley also really writes Hack/Slash as an ongoing, periodical comic. Sure, he’ll collect this stuff eventually into a trade paperback (and that will read just fine, you silly trade waiters), but he uses that classic comic story structure of kicking off the next story as the first story is wrapping up. This gives the reader the kinda “oh shit!” moment that keeps us coming back for the next issue. We want to see what happens next! Why can’t all comics be this way?
We also get to see a little bit of personal growth from Vlad. Long-term readers of this series will know that Cassie really treats Vlad like crap. She’s so moody, bitchy and distant that you really wonder why Vlad hangs around with her. By having Vlad grow emotionally, it should force Cassie out of her funk, so we should be seeing character growth from both these characters individually and as a team!
It is always a little hard to critique the art in Hack/Slash without sounding like a pervert (e.g. “I LOVE how Leister draws womens’ butts!”), but Leister does do a good job of drawing an overly sexy woman. Sure, that isn’t what women really look like, but I don’t think that Hack/Slash is trying to be realistic. There’s also never a panel where you’re confused about what is going on, so it succeeds from a storytelling standpoint. However, the high art point for me was a singular page where the art and coloring change up when Cassie and Vlad are drugged and handcuffed to a bed. THAT page was awesome. I’d love a whole issue that looked like that.
What’s Not So Good: It isn’t that this issue isn’t new reader friendly, but Seeley has a LOT going on for what might be many readers’ second issue with these characters. He does include a two page dramatis personae and I was able to keep the action straight just fine, but I don’t think it would hurt this series to be streamlined a little bit. The great slasher films dont’ have casts this large except at the beginning before the bad guy starts to kill folks.
Also, as a personal preference, I wouldn’t mind seeing a different coloring style. Some folks like this heavily rendered coloring where the colorist is adding most of the surface contours to objects, but it’s not really my thing. I’d rather see more elaborate linework with cross-hatching and flatter colors. This isn’t really the “fault” of the colorist as it’s more of an artistic choice made by the entire creative team.
Conclusion: Minor quibbles aside, Seeley is continuing to deliver the violence and sex appeal that readers of Hack/Slash want. It isn’t going to be everyone’s cup of tea, but for those who love this kinda stuff it hits hits the spot.
Grade: C+
- Dean Stell
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Filed under: Image Comics Tagged: comic book reviewsw, Daniel Leister, Hack/Slash, Hack/Slash #2, Hack/Slash #2 review, James Lowder, Mark Englert, scantily clad women, slasher, Slasher comics, Tim Seeley, Weekly Comic Book Review
